


What Time Leaves Behind

by waterbird13



Series: Growing Old [2]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Andy is dying, Angst, Death and Dying, Family, Found Family, Gen, Grief, Introspection, Nile Freeman-centric, Of old age, Sad, but not dead yet, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-12
Updated: 2020-08-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:55:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25862440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waterbird13/pseuds/waterbird13
Summary: One day, Andy will be gone, and Nile will go on, and it still terrifies her to think of that, as much as it did sixty years ago.Nile is eighty-five years old, and she's so old and yet so young.Or: We aren't meant to be alone.
Series: Growing Old [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1876672
Comments: 19
Kudos: 133





	What Time Leaves Behind

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, all.
> 
> Okay, straight up: I put this in a series with the other fic because in my mind it's the same Nile (a little further down in her thinking of what exactly time is and what it means to her). BUT: this one is sadder, and they absolutely do not have to be read together.
> 
> This is a sad fic! No one actually dies, but Andy is very, very old and is dying. She's lived a very long life, but this is all reflecting on death and what that means for them. 
> 
> A couple things: 
> 
> It's not discussed here, but I have Booker and Quynh kind of roaming the world together. Sort of a rediscovery type thing.
> 
> I set Nile's physical age at 25. I know it's 27 in the comics, but if the movie takes place in 2019, and the promotional materials say she's born in 1994, so therefore she's 25.
> 
> Joe and Nicky are very important and critical to Nile, but don't actually have a speaking role here.
> 
> And very important, I cannot emphasize enough that this is a sad fic about death and dying, and time, and also family.

Nile is  _ old _ .

Nile is old enough that she should be well into collecting social security, that she should get senior discounts everywhere she goes, and that the few old friends she keeps tabs on have, in some cases, great grandchildren.

Nile is eighty-five years old. Her mother has been dead and buried for almost twenty years. Her childhood home doesn’t exist anymore, and her baby brother has six grandchildren and two great grandkids so far.

The gun she went to war with is obsolete and forgotten, and, worryingly, that stupid, painful, hurtful war is heading the same way in America. There’s something about forgetting history there, and she’s now old enough to have seen that all before.

Nile is old. Nile is old enough to know better, old enough to be weary, old enough to have seen it all a time or two.

Nile looks twenty-five years old, still. Nile blends in on college campuses, Nile still gets carded sometimes. As Booker once told her, she will always be the young woman who died that day. 

Nile is still the baby of the group. They listen to her, they feel her pain at the abrupt transition she’s going through, but mostly she gets elbowed in the side and told “ _ maybe _ talk to me when you’ve got a century under your belt, then we’ll talk” jokingly when she complains.

Joe and Nicky are officially each a thousand now. They’ve got some time on her.

Still, nothing makes Nile feel as old—not her great-nieces and nephews out in the world, not the changing politics, nothing—as sitting with Andy.

They’ve done everything they can to keep Andy at home, up to and including Nile, Joe, and Nicky getting nursing degrees, almost twenty years ago. Andy had bitched and complained something awful at the time, but having those degrees prove to be the difference between Andy at home with them or in a nursing home.

They’ve made a real home, remote from most everyone else but not a far drive to town, or the nearest hospital. Not that Andy would ever let them take her to a hospital. They’ve done work over the years, adding a wheelchair ramp as Andy’s knees go and handrails, moving her bedroom to the first floor. 

Joe tells her it’s the longest they’ve stayed anywhere in a long, long time. Nile doesn’t want to think about it, but it probably won’t be for that much longer.

None of them, Andy included, know exactly how old Andy was when she died the first time. They’re guessing her physical age right now to be about ninety, though, maybe even higher. And Andy, even when she knew what the consequences would be, was never kind to her body.

Andy likes being outside, and honestly, if she had her way, might never come inside from the porch, or, when she’s up from it, the yard. They indulge as much as they can, spending time outside. They serve meals out there, and sometimes doze when the night is warm.

Andy holds Nile’s hand, and watches the sunset.

“What’re you up to tomorrow?” She asks. 

Nile shrugs. “Oh, you know. A shift at the hospital.”

Andy snorts. “Never thought you’d be a nurse.”

It’s an easy cover story, Nile thinks but doesn’t say. She has the degree, even if Booker had to update the year on it. This keeps her skills sharp and current for Andy, and gives their strange house an air of normality. And she gets to help people.

“I like it.”

“And then?”

“Then I’ll be home,” Nile says. “We can do whatever you want.”

“You don’t have to base your life around me,” Andy snaps.

Nile bites her tongue. Doesn’t say of course she does. Doesn’t say it’s not an imposition, because as much as she wants—craves—to have Andy forever, it won't be, and she’s just beginning to even loosely understand how much time she has left to her. What are a few years? 

One day, Andy will be gone, and Nile will go on, and it still terrifies her to think of that, as much as it did sixty years ago.

“I’m not,” she says simply. 

Andy sighs. “I never thought I’d get this old.”

This is a conversation they’ve had before. Probably will again. Andy’s now had sixty years to come to terms with her own mortality. Then again, most mortals go their entire lifetime thinking about it, and most don’t ever come to terms with it. Andy can be excused in her need to re-hash the details as she works through it.

“Thought I’d die in battle,” Andy continues, and Nile knows this too. “Either for my people, or…or like Lykon. Or any of the jobs we took after…”

Nile squeezes her hand. “You’re too good to let someone else kill you, Boss,” she murmurs. 

Andy snorts. “I’m not your Boss anymore.”

“Sure about that?”

“Yes,” Andy says, now looking at Nile. “Your Boss will be dead in the ground soon, Nile, and you can’t let that happen. Not to them. You need to keep us all together.” She closes her eyes for a moment. “This group doesn’t have to look like when I was here. I’m not the boss anymore. But you all need to keep yourselves together. We’re not meant to be alone.”

Nile looks back at the house for a second, where Joe and Nicky can be seen through the big window, making dinner for the four of them. Looks at the table big enough for six, with two places not set.

Booker and Quynh have been roaming for a long time now.

Andy squeezes her hand again to draw her attention back. “You’re young still,” she murmurs. “You still have what it takes.”

“I’m old enough to be a great-grandma,” Nile argues, but half-heartedly.

“I’m old enough I can’t even count the greats,” Andy retorts. She sighs. “Promise me you’ll all look after each other.”

“You know we will.” She swallows. “I promise.”

“And it’s okay to let things change. I won’t be there. Don’t leave a hole for me. Find a new way to do things.”

“There will always be a hole for you, Andy.”

Andy smiles, and then tilts to the side so her head is on Nile’s shoulder. Nile brings up her free hand to stroke Andy’s hair, fine and white now. 

“Nile?”

“Mhm?”

Andy sighs, a soft breath against her neck. “It’s time to call the others home.”

Nile feels her throat tighten, and works to keep her hands soft against Andy. “Alright,” she manages after a second.

Andy sits up. “Don’t cry for me, kid. I’ve lived more of a life than anyone else. When it’s our time, it’s our time.”

“I can cry for you anyways, Boss,” Nile manages, but she doesn’t cry. Not then.

She strokes Andy’s hair again, then goes inside to make the call like Andy asked, out of Andy’s earshot, because she’s not sure she can let Quynh and Booker know that Andy’s time is coming without sobbing.

She has the phone in hand, but Joe and Nicky see her first, before she can dial. Nicky gently takes the phone from her, and Joe envelops her in a hug.

They already know, clearly. Nicky just adds himself around them, kisses her temple while Joe rubs her back, and the three of them take a moment to cry together.

Nile is…old and young at the same time. These men have seen death on a scale she still can’t yet quite calculate, but for all of them, this is the first time one of their own has died. 

They hold her tight, and she doesn’t let go. 


End file.
